Page 49 - Morgan Housel - The Psychology of Money_ Timeless Lessons on Wealth, Greed, and Happiness-Harriman House Limited (2020)

And the hedge fund manager who makes $340 million per year compares
himself to the top five hedge fund managers, who earned at least $770
COBACOBA
million in 2018. Those top managers can look ahead to people like Warren

Buffett, whose personal fortune increased by $3.5 billion in 2018. And
someone like Buffett could look ahead to Jeff Bezos, whose net worth
increased by $24 billion in 2018—a sum that equates to more per hour than
the “rich” baseball player made in a full year.

The point is that the ceiling of social comparison is so high that virtually no
one will ever hit it. Which means it’s a battle that can never be won, or that
the only way to win is to not fight to begin with—to accept that you might
have enough, even if it’s less than those around you.

A friend of mine makes an annual pilgrimage to Las Vegas. One year he

asked a dealer: What games do you play, and what casinos do you play in?
The dealer, stone-cold serious, replied: “The only way to win in a Las Vegas
casino is to exit as soon as you enter.”

That’s exactly how the game of trying to keep up with other people’s wealth
works, too.

3. “Enough” is not too little.

The idea of having “enough” might look like conservatism, leaving
opportunity and potential on the table.

I don’t think that’s right.

“Enough” is realizing that the opposite—an insatiable appetite for more—
will push you to the point of regret.

The only way to know how much food you can eat is to eat until you’re
sick. Few try this because vomiting hurts more than any meal is good. For
some reason the same logic doesn’t translate to business and investing, and

many will only stop reaching for more when they break and are forced to.